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Observations on Consultation Drafts, PPS 12 And Guide to LDF Preparation
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- 13 We are also intrigued to contemplate what would be the practical situation where a plan or parts of it were to fall away without a replacement yet being in place. If the preparation of a relevant DPD was advanced it would be a significant material consideration, and so could be important in decision -making. But it would seem odd for decisions to have to be made solely against an emerging plan, when otherwise the existing statutory development plan would have been the starting point.
- And what if there was no emerging DPD yet (perhaps because the authority had not yet reached submission to the SoS)? While the "lost" development plan would have no formal standing, in the absence of anything else both developers and the planning authority would have cause to refer to it as some kind of basis for decision-making. It is suggested that in reality, lost plans would still have to be extensively used until relevant DPDs were adopted.
- Drawing this together, the view of the Society is that in the change to a new and unfamiliar system, the risks associated with the three year cut-off on saving existing plans are too great to take. We suspect that in practice this would lead the SoS to give extensions of time almost automatically, even where an authority was slow in progressing its LDF, as being preferable to leaving no statutory plan in place. One has to question whether the proposal would be of any real effect.
- If, notwithstanding these observations, it is decided to leave the three year saving period in place, the Society would urge -
- that both the PPS and the Guide should make it clear that there will be a presumption in favour of extending the saving period. At present there is inconsistency between para 5.2.3 of the former and para 5.2 of the latter, which is considered unrealistic anyway, for the reasons set out here.
- that advice is also included that as the three year date approaches, all authorities should review where they are with LDD preparation and make appropriate and timely application to extend their existing development plan or parts of it which have not yet been replaced, as the case may be.
- On a more detailed point, we can see no reference to a District Council being able to save policies from the structure plan, (this apparently being restricted to the Regional Planning Body). There are instances where structure plan policies are used in development control, or to set a clear context, and where Districts may be expected to see the need to retain such policies where they will not be of sufficient strategic importance for the RPB to do so. Unless we have misunderstood the matter, we suggest that this should be covered in the transitional provisions.
- Saving Supplementary Planning Guidance - As noted above, many authorities have over the years produced a substantial amount of supplementary guidance, which is used to guide development and assist applicants and other parties. Clearly, as part of an orderly transition to the new system, authorities should be able to continue to use and apply their existing SPG, albeit recognising that it will not have the same status as supplementary planning documents(SPDs) prepared under the new system.
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